Before Me

My heart keys "help"
Wanting You right there
Closer than You are to me now

You are too far from me
My shell wanting to be wrapped

By Your physical presence

Your Spirit comforts
But imagining arms reaching
Is failure . . . I need You before me

I pray, "Give me arms to fall into"
I pray, "Give me ears that have lips"
I pray, "Give me a man with God's heart"

Here I stand in a field of searching hearts
Where only one exists for me
Who carries tears like mine

And before me, through all my denial
You place him, in all his difficulties
Crying out to You, as well, with the same prayer

Cancer

Indy, 2012

after Lucille Clifton
Issue 1

What If Conspiracy Created Sin

What if Lucifer approached Adam   first


and first man’s yellow backbone   connived


with the fallen morning star

to create the ultimate   scapegoat


where sin was blamed between   the legs

scabs scabs, this is all i have left

“Oh, God—did I just say that? It must be the scar speaking of me, through me,
with or without the permission of my long-hurt heart.” —George Kalamaras

Yes, God, I hear you.

Daughter, I know you hear me, but are you listening?

The tsunami is coming daughter. The waters have receded and you are standing on muddy ground. Your scarred feet are not healing in the gooey reservoir your feet are now glued in. Do you not notice the mud turning to dry ground around your ankles after all your fallen tears. You cannot run anymore. Even your tears leave your feet. They cannot stay to soothe the scabs because you do not listen to their drops, to their lingering upon your cheek, to their taste upon your tongue. You have given them no choice but to escape the scabs you attach to scabs. Your tears have become silent to you. You need not stand in dry ground to drown in the rush, if you would only listen.

Daughter, listen closely. The tsunami is coming. Your tears knew when they would return. You will die only for a short time. I am here to lift you out. Just reach up. I have heard your crying, but you have not listened to me. The scabs are deep and you have attached hope in the wrong place. The walls of tears are coming back to drown you, for a bit, but stroke up, stroke hard, do not sob anymore, break the surface, my daughter, I am here waiting to grab your hand so you will not be washed out with the scabs.

Sorrow for Wisdom

    I came upon this woman in the hospital sanctuary.  I almost missed her as I began to pass the open door.  The voice I heard escaping the room just caught me.  The chapel in all its decorative wood and lilies placed lavishly across the mantel hid the light skinned woman in her two-toned earth brown top and skirt.  She was singing—no, not actually singing, more like a talk-sing, a mantra, a lovely blend of sound.  I would have never noticed the accent, except when she sobbed a prayer, and that speech brought me to her eyes; I had to see those eyes, the doorway into the soul—blue; no, green; no, gold; changing with each lament she made, with each sound, each pattern of tone.  It’s hard to describe the musical quality flowing from her lips in a musical way, in any way.  And the sound, the sound cascading over the lilies, the wood, flooding the room like a giggling brook; but I knew, even with the beautiful sound there was sorrow, deep sorrow.  It didn’t matter I couldn’t understand, she brought light into a hopeless heart, and oddly the light identified with the sorrow, called the sorrow, asked the sorrow for wisdom, spoke to the pain.

Chickenfucker

Chicken poop
            Concealer
            Corn meal on beef
            Traveling salesman
                                              Lay on the grass
                                              rubbermaid
                                              tupperware
                                              No protection in the pocket
     Cock                      Cock                          Cock
                              a doodle
                        everywhere find

Chicken poop
            Spread eagle                          too many
                                                          times                            forms
                      promise                       bells                             jewels
                                                          security                                    seafood alfredo
                     Brownie points in bonfire
                                melt the chocolate                                 let it run
                                fill in the body              hiding
           with a broken shell of volunteer fireman
                                                                      army

                     Don't hate me
                     I don't                           Love me
                     I do, I will

Chicken poop
            in fear to be
            in anger . . . runs
           from self from family from self from girl from self

                                                          Eye socket left rips
                                                                      rips lungs
                                                                      rips gut
                                                                      rips loins
                                                                     promises rip left                              behind for
                                 Jolie ole sole at the heel of me
Chicken poop
           Daddy wants to kill
           Brother wants to kill
                                                                         the boy in the shell of a man: Chickenfucker
           Mom . . . crying, dying with me
                                                                         i'm the chick in fuck her

at me

It is hard for me
            to concentrate
on the work     I must
            do;     you
                      are always on my     mind.
I argue
    with myself,     “concentrate,     focus”
but my mind skips
               words,     seeing
                    you
                          staring
                              at me.